My Nine Craziest Yoga Classes Around the World

A peripatetic yoga teacher doesn’t have a regular schedule. That said, I came across some amazing places to practice – environments that seemed to be calling for it – and I could always rustle up some students.

Here are some of the most memorable:

Miami, USA. The last class I taught in the US was on the day they turned Biscayne Boulevard into a park and the DJ thought it would be appropriate to play ‘Sexual Healing’ throughout the entire yoga class.

Camino de Santiago, Spain. The morning before setting off from Güemes, I led a group of pilgrims gathered together in a short pre-walk yoga session.

Negev desert, Israel. At the rainbow festival I taught a class to twenty-five rainbow family members.

Varanasi, India. I gave a class on the rooftop of the hotel and had to use a stick to keep monkeys from swiping the sandals of the students during savasana.

Teaching Class in Luang Prabang, Laos

Luang Prabang, Laos. We practiced on a platform listening to the bells and buddhist monks.

Montreal, Canada. I found cool company in the tight-knit community at the Sivananda studio. I eventually spent a couple of months practicing and met a man who opened up an opportunity to go to Brazil.

Trindade, Brazil. One of my happy places, I spent four months there in early 2015 teaching yoga every day in the middle of the rainforest.

Rishikesh, India. I spent an intense six weeks in a yoga ashram practicing four times each day. My day would end on the banks of the Ganges taking the practice of yoga into the philosophy of yoga.

Srinigar, Kashmir. We practiced on the deck of a houseboat in Dal Lake.

Thinking back to these experiences allows me to channel a bit of that peace and bring it to some of my classes in New York. Stay tuned.

Where is the most interesting place you’ve practiced yoga?

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I live on the mid north coast of NSW Australia, and my first yoga studio up here was perched on a rain forested mountain (such as we have here – perhaps large hill would be more descriptive), open on one side to let the dogs in and out with a view of their enormous vegie garden. I loved it 😊

Interesting place: on the deck of the boat anchored off Key Largo. Even in the calm weather, it rocks gently, and keeping balance is a challenge. Sunrise in the Keys, though, is full of calm and quiet energy, which makes yoga even more special. I also think that ocean air makes one’s body more flexible, or maybe it’s just my thing.

I love the monkey story 🙂 my favorite yoga is always outside, whether on the beach in Costa Rica or the mountain peaks in Alaska. My most memorable yoga didn’t end up really counting as a yoga experience, unfortunately. I signed up for a week long yoga retreat in Costa Rica before a gap year. Totally planned to set my intention and meditate through movement. But when I got there there was a mix up and they actually had NO yoga. At all. That was an interesting trip.

Happy that I found your blog ! Inspiring and actually reassuring to see that other people actually live from their passion and make it happen despite how much the system is trying to make all of us follow the same path. I am starting my journey and hopefully I will also get to practise in such great places around the world. Yoga is wonderful. Keep going ! 🙂

In Luang Prabang with a friend, we found an open field and started stretching and then began our yoga. We were upside down in headstands with our eyes closed and when we came down and opened our eyes, we were surrounded by about fifteen curious children who had just gotten out of school. They ended up finding the poses both fun and funny as we resumed our practice teaching these awesome kids.
Another time I was living in Hengyang in Hunan, China. I met a local esthetician and we became friends. She said her studio had a hot yoga room but no one knew how to teach so they never used it. So I said I could lead some classes in hot Bikram yoga, which is actually my preferred method. No one spoke English but I was able to direct their postures and movement in Chinese, with a little difficulty, but everyone had a great experience and we ended up meeting a few more times before my assignment in that city ended.